From Cracked Open Skies - A World in Fluctuation

Chapter 14 - The ??? Marionette

It was just sorta slightly maybe really pissing him off.

Sandwiched between the princely, majestic Jay and the knightly, handsome Mirelle, Roless felt like screaming, like hurling a door at all the flabbergasted students that the trio passed by. They walked through the hallways with enough shiny sparkles that it was like a winter wonderland, and every student in the vicinity had their mouths agape at the sight. A blond prince and a brunette knight, each radiating an aura of confidence, while the oddity, Roless, was stuck in the crossfire of their conversation.

The female students were definitely envious of the unruly amnesiac, who looked like he was commanding the attention of both of these hunks, while the male students were equally jealous of how he was part of some sort of inner circle of real-life bishounens.

Even though Mirelle was a girl.

Even though Jay was a zombie.

Ah, how tiresome.

It’d be nice if he could interrupt the two and make a narcissistic quip, but the subject at hand was also quite important, with Mirelle filling Jay in onto all the things that he missed while treading the boundary of sleep and wakefulness. He tuned them out as he kept his eyes on the ground, avoiding the gazes of pretty much every other student, and ignoring all the whispered speculations that spread behind them like backwash.

“You’re listening, right?” Like a sword, Mirelle’s voice cut through his wall.

He shrugged, bluntly stating, “Nope.”

What honesty got him was a slap on the head. Nice to see that good deeds are rewarded or whatnot.

“Now now,” Jay said soothingly, “I’m fine with repeating my speculations, Mirelle.”

Mirelle slowly turned her glare away from Roless, instead doing her best to intimidate the wall that was around them.

The bespectacled man sighed at her special brand of immaturity. Though she was disciplined, hard-working, and nice, Mirelle definitely disliked showing such sides to Roless. She was too hard on him, really, but at the same time, it was understandable why. Putting away his thoughts, he said, “Roless, we were talking about the state of story. More specifically…”

Roless interrupted, eager to put his new knowledge to use. “You were talking about the theme, I guess? Or the framework of the plot?”

“Oh, very good. But do you know what those are, in the context of this world?”

“Well, other than the fact that it’s Banri-centered…”

The blond smiled, walking towards an open window and leaning over it. Students were still trickling in through the gates, and a murder of crows flew high, as if grazing the clouds with the tips of their black wings. “Tell me what you know of him then.”

Roless followed Jay and began to count qualities off his fingers. “He’s…lazy, unmotivated, good at artsy things, easy to bully, a loner, a coward, and pretty much uninteresting overall, if you don’t rile him up. Wait, no, also a foodsnatching bastard.”

“Now, the world?”

“Plain, boring, normal. None of the super cool magical psychic powers that you’d see in books. I guess, relatively speaking, you can also say that it’s modern?”

He faced away from the window and turned towards the amnesiac once more. “A story about a normal person in a normal world, with no particular friends nor any obvious interests or ambitions. What sort of story is that?”

The younger man struggled for a bit, before shrugging in defeat. “A dairy?”

Jay laughed, before saying, “No, but I can understand that everything here doesn’t make for a very entertaining story.”